XI. 1766. BOOK lar feeling by a clause assuring complete indemnity and oblivion to all persons who had been concerned in the riots. The temper by which they were actuated was significantly disclosed by a resolution which they passed, "that it was the indispensable duty of the sufferers to have applied first to the government here, instead of to the government at home.” Though the bill was affirmed by the governor, its terins, and especially the provision of indemnity to the rioters, gave much offence to the British court. It was subsequently annulled by the king: but the annulment received little notice, and produced no effect. Hutchinson was so far from making any open objection to accept the sum awarded to him, as a generous gift, instead of a just retribution, that after the bill was passed, he desired leave to express his grateful thanks for it to the assembly. The parliamentary injunction of compensation to the persons who had suffered from the riots, was rendered still farther unpopular by mean and rapacious attempts of individuals to take unjust advantage of it. Messervé, in particular, who had resigned the office of distributor of stamps in New Hampshire, found the approbation of his fellow-citizens a reward too unsubstantial for his appetite; and claimed from the assembly of this province a pecuniary compensation for his losses. But the assembly, finding that he had lost nothing but his office, disallowed his claim; and he forthwith became a partizan of the British court, which rewarded him with an appointment in England.1 Among other important consequences which resulted from the Stamp Act quarrel and the dangerous extremity to which it had been pushed, were, that it paved the way to a permanent union of the public councils and policy of all the American states; and, in every one of them, showed to the people the men who were best fitted to be their leaders, and on whose genius, courage, and patriotism, they might securely rely. When a federal league between the provinces was proposed in the year 1754, the origination of this project with the British government was sufficient to inspire the Americans with a suspicious aversion to it, which combined with and was aided by the jealousies and distractions that prevailed among Belknap. Bradford. Hutchinson. Gordon. Pitkin. Ann. Reg. for 1766. II. 1766. themselves. But during the late quarrel, their mutual jea- CHA P. lousies had been swallowed up in the sense of common interest and danger; and they saw that purposes of union had been promoted by all the most considerate as well as the most animated assertors of American liberty, and thwarted only by the partizans of British prerogative. The quarrel had been pushed so far, and America had so daringly rebelled, that for some time a revolutionary war was contemplated by many, and the most violent and vindictive infliction of British force expected by all. This was a time that tried men's souls, and called forth those master spirits which in ordinary seasons have no perceptible existence, because no appropriate sphere of action. Hitherto the great bulk of the inhabitants of America had confined the exertion of their active and reflective powers to the cultivation of their territorial resources, and the improvement of their domestic accommodations: they had, indeed, often jealously watched and sometimes boldly questioned particular restraints imposed on them by the parent state: but, in the main, they submitted or deemed that they submitted peaceably to her guidance and authority; and so far their minds were accommodated to a state of national pupillage. But now all at once was the restraint of British authority suspended: all the American communities were for the first time united in one common purpose and course of action which arrayed them in open defiance of the parent state: and hopes the most elevated and ambitious, dangers at once awful and animating, and projects vast, unbounded, and interesting, combined to inflame the ardour, to rouse and collect the fortitude, and to nourish and elicit the genius and capacity of the American people. Republican governments and democratical interests, especially in the beginning of a revolutionary controversy with opposite principles, have a wonderful influence in uniting ambition with virtue, and in stimulating and diffusing the energy of their partizans. A rich and powerful spring of oratory, at once the fruit and the instrument of political agitation and republican sentiment, now broke forth in America. The orators, formed by the occasion, turned the occasion to their account. Their glowing language awakened in the bosoms of their countrymen feelings long and deeply cherished, and which rushed XI. BOOK into light and life from the obscurity and silence to which they had been hitherto condemned, with the vigour of maturity and the vivacity of fresh existence. 1766. Leading in Ame rica Ran dolph The most remarkable of the political leaders and orators politicians who sprung up at this period, were natives of Virginia, Massachusetts and South Carolina. In Virginia there were particularly distinguished, after Patrick Henry whom we have already repeatedly noticed, and who held the first place as a popular champion and favourite, Edmund Pendleton, a graceful and persuasive speaker, a subtle and dexterous politician, energetic and indefatigable in the conduct of business; Richard Bland, celebrated for the extent and accuracy of his knowledge, unrivalled among his contemporaries as a logician, and who published this year an Inquiry into the Rights of the British Colonies, in which the recent claims of America were defended with much cogency of reasoning; George Wythe, not more admired for the strength of his capacity and the elegance of his wit, than respected for the simplicity and integrity of his character; Peyton Randolph, whose high repute and influence with his countrymen, unaided by the captivation of eloquence, was founded on qualities more honourable both to him and to them, the solid powers of his understanding, and the sterling virtues of his heart; and Richard Henry Lee, one of the most accomplished scholars and orators in America, and who was commonly styled the Virginian Cicero. Washington calmly but firmly espoused the cause of his native country in opposition to the pretensions of the British government: nor was there an individual more respected in Virginia, or more generally known and esteemed by all America than himself; but, devoid of oratorical powers, tranquil, sedate, prudent, dignified, and reserved, he was little qualified by genius or habit, to make a brilliant figure as a provincial politician, and waited the development of a grander scene of counsel and action, more adapted to the illustration of his majestic wisdom and superior sense. Various other individuals who have gained renown as defenders of the liberty and founders of the independence of America, began, shortly after this period, to be distinguished in the list of Virginian politicians; of whom the most remarkable was Thomas Jefferson Jefferson, pre-eminent as a statesman, scholar, and philosopher; II. a forcible, perspicuous, and elegant writer; an intrepid and CHAP. enterprising patriot, and an ardent and inflexible assertor of republican sentiments, and the principles of purest democracy. 1766. From the very dawn of the controversy between Britain and America, Jefferson and his friend and patron Wythe had outstripped the political views of most of the cotemporary American patriots, and embraced the doctrine which ascribed indeed to the crown some prerogative, but denied to the parliament any degree or species of legitimate control over America. Arthur, the brother of Richard Henry Lee, and afterwards ambassador from America to France, was at this time pursuing the study of the law in London, but more actively engaged, as a gratuitous coadjutor of Dr. Franklin, in watching the measures of the British government; and rendered important service to his countrymen by transmitting early intelligence of the ministerial plans and purposes. In Massachusetts at this period, the most distinguished popular leaders and champions of the cause of America, were James Otis, who has already engaged our observation; Samuel Adams, John Hancock, Thomas Cushing, and James Bowdoin, merchants; Samuel Cooper a clergyman; Josiah Quincy a lawyer; and John Winthrop professor of mathematics in Harvard college. Samuel Adams was one of the most perfect Adams models of disinterested patriotism, and of republican genius and character in all its austerity and simplicity, that any age or country has ever produced. At college, in the year 1743, he made an early display of those political sentiments which he cherished through life, by maintaining in the thesis which gained him his literary degree, that "it is lawful to resist the supreme magistrate, if the commonwealth cannot otherwise be preserved." A sincere and devout puritan in religion, grave in his manners, pure in his morals, simple, frugal, and unambitious in his tastes, habits, and desires; zealously and incorruptibly devoted to the defence of American liberty, and the improvement of American character; endowed with a strong manly understanding, a capacity of patient and intense application which no labour could exhaust, and a calm and determined courage which no danger could daunt, and no disaster depress; he rendered his virtues more efficacious by the instrumentality of great powers of reasoning and XI. 1766. BOOK eloquence; and altogether supported a part and exhibited a character of which every description even the most frigid that has been preserved, wears the air of panegyric. He defended the liberty of his countrymen against the tyranny of England, and their religious principles against the impious sophistry of Paine. Poor, without desiring to be rich, he subsequently filled the first offices in the state without making the slightest augmentation to his fortune; and after an active, useful, and illustrious life, in which all the interests of the individual were merged in public care and concernment, he died without obtaining or desiring any other reward than the consciousness, of virtue and integrity, the contemplation of his country's happiness and the respect and veneration of his fellow citizens. It has been censoriously remarked of him by the severer critics of his history,—and the censure is the more interesting from the rarity of its application to the great men of modern times, that his character was superior to his genius, and that his mind was much more elevated and firm than liberal and expansive. In all his sentiments, religious and political, no doubt, there appeared some tincture of those peculiar principles and qualities which had formed the original and distinctive character of the people of New England; and he was much more impressed with the worth and piety, than sensible of or adverse to the narrow bigotry and rigid severity Hancock of his provincial ancestors. Hancock differed widely from Adams in manners, character, and condition. He was possessed of an ample fortune, and maintained a splendid equipage; but while he indulged a gay disposition in elegant and expensive pleasures, he manifested a generous liberality in the most munificent contributions to every charitable and patriotic purpose: insomuch that his fellow-citizens declared of him that he plainly preferred their favour to great riches, and sunk his fortune in the cause of his country. Courteous and graceful in his address, eager and enthusiastic in his disposition, endowed with a prompt and lively eloquence, which was supported by considerable abilities, though by no means united with brilliant genius or commanding capacity, he embraced the popular cause with the most vehement ardour, and leaving to more philosophical patriots the guardianship of public virtue and the control of popular licence, he devoted himself |